The Dangers of Democracy

[Keryn]

Gene wrote:

You missed my point completely.

Oh, good!  Care to set me straight? 

[Gene]

Keryn wrote:

Gene wrote:

You missed my point completely.

Oh, good! Care to set me straight?

Re-read, can’t state my reservations more plain than I already have.

its nothing to do with a hypothetical me being borne in France

[Gene]

I’ll try again to make my point:

the Urantia book painstakingly came to us in English over many years of hard work by superhuman beings that very carefully chose their words. In reading these words of the English language we get facts, meanings and values, and we get truth. Truth is not the words but it is derived from the words and out intellects and our personalities. Its a no brained to state with confidence that this is the intent of the authors.

i realize that the desire to spread the revelation around the planet for all to benefit happens. People want this because of their experience with the revelation.

translating the text into different languages seems at first to be a good way to accomplish this.

lots of effort has gone into translations so it’s happening.

but translations of words by humans is suspect in relation to revelation by super human beings. Are we 💯 % certain that translated words convey the truths in the revelation? It’s a bit arrogant to make that assumption imho. But I realize I’m in the minority on this issue.

Eden and Dalamatia could easily be used as patterns to get the word out to a savage public for a different way to think about this.

[Keryn]

Thanks, Gene. That helped a lot; now I think I understand and I agree with you that there is no way to be sure that our human translations of TUB into other languages is 100% correct or even fits with the intent of the authors of the revelation.  I guess my feeling on that is, what is the alternative?

You present a potential alternative:

Gene wrote:

Eden and Dalamatia could easily be used as patterns to get the word out to a savage public for a different way to think about this.

Very interesting possibility.  However, I am unclear as to how doing this would eliminate the problem of translating the TUB teachings into other languages?  Even if we trained up teachers in America/ the Eden/ Dalamatia model, those teachers would need to communicate the teachings and most likely present the written material to their non-English speaking students of the “savage public”, for instance.  You propose that this could “easily” be done but I guess I am once again, no-brained, because I’m still not getting it.

(Unless your method involves superhuman/ celestial beings doing the work of teaching the public. But, of course, if we were allowed to have celestial beings in physical form ministering to us in a commonplace way on this planet, we wouldn’t be in this mess to begin with.)

[Bradly]

Just wanted to agree that translations are the reality – well done or ill advised, doesn’t matter to the reality.  I would note that all translations are subject to multiple revisions and new editions and some are in their third or more.  The translations team is expanding and busy at the best translations possible…over time and new reviews/edits and greater scholarship and translating skills.  But it is also true that English was chosen for a reason as Palestine, Joseph, and Mary were chosen.  And regardless of the mandate, like Keryn, I can’t imagine NOT translating such an important text….and China is one of many countries teaching English in school.  Bilingual and multilingual readers might indeed manage the accuracy of all future translations.  From the Foundation’s site:

“Urantia Foundation is committed to producing high quality translations of The Urantia Book that faithfully represent the English text in all major languages. Thanks to the many dedicated, multi-lingual readers working with the Foundation, the book has been translated into Dutch, Estonian, Finnish, French, German, Hungarian, Italian, Korean, Lithuanian, Polish, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish and Swedish, and the books are distributed in countries where these languages are spoken. Chinese, Japanese, and Farsi (Persian) translations are under development. Additional translations by readers as “works of love” are under review and may be published by Urantia Foundation in the future.
After a translation is printed the work of revising and correcting the translation begins. No translation is ever really finished; there is always room for improvement. Teams of revisers work with the Translation Manager to improve translation already in print. Currently revision teams are working on the Spanish, French, Portuguese, Russian, and Korean texts.”

[Gene]

Keryn wrote:

Thanks, Gene. That helped a lot; now I think I understand and I agree with you that there is no way to be sure that our human translations of TUB into other languages is 100% correct or even fits with the intent of the authors of the revelation. I guess my feeling on that is, what is the alternative?

You present a potential alternative:

Gene wrote:

Eden and Dalamatia could easily be used as patterns to get the word out to a savage public for a different way to think about this.

Very interesting possibility. However, I am unclear as to how doing this would eliminate the problem of translating the TUB teachings into other languages? Even if we trained up teachers in America/ the Eden/ Dalamatia model, those teachers would need to communicate the teachings and most likely present the written material to their non-English speaking students of the “savage public”, for instance. You propose that this could “easily” be done but I guess I am once again, no-brained, because I’m still not getting it. (Unless your method involves superhuman/ celestial beings doing the work of teaching the public. But, of course, if we were allowed to have celestial beings in physical form ministering to us in a commonplace way on this planet, we wouldn’t be in this mess to begin with.)

its just an idea based on the fact that Eden and Dalamatia were revealed to us.  There is a reason, it’s not just for the sake of pure history. They were centers for education, with the intent to draw in the finest minds and turn out organized groups to spread the teachings.

Anyone can extrapolate alternative ideas from these models that are reasonable using imagination, weather or not there is any validity to it.

however, book translations are the chosen path and that’s a reality. There are many religious entities out there that are realities and they all have some value, translations will have some value.

someone in the distant future will evaluate based on history.

if the NT Bibles (plural for a reason) are any example of editing and translating, I think anyone can see a problem as the authors of TUB made the decision to re-tell the 4th epochal revelation to clarify. Maybe TUB may need the same retelling in a couple thousand years??

[Bonita]

Although I do worry about corruption of the text by translation, I’m more freaked out by corruption of the text by those people who claim English to be their native language.  Sorry to say, I’ve seen my share of it . . . and apparently it can’t be stopped either.

[Van Amadon]

Oh what to do?

God help us all.

(Please)

 

 

[Gene]

Van Amadon wrote:

Oh what to do? God help us all. (Please)

getting my own house in order is just about more than I can handle

if I could do that maybe someone would notice and I would have a possible for intro to TUB.

[Author]

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